Chapter 14 Flashcards
What is the study of the sounds used in speech?
phonology
Which of the following was studied by Sapir and Whorf?
the influence of language on thought
The linguist Noam Chomsky has argued that the human brain contains a limited set of rules for organizing language, so that all languages have a common structural basis. He calls this set of rules
the universal grammar.
________ refers to the specialized set of terms and distinctions that are particularly important to certain groups.
Focal vocabulary
Romance languages like French and Spanish are daughter languages of Latin, which is their common
protolanguage
A key feature of language that helps explain anthropologists’ continued interest in studying it is that it
is always changing.
What is an example of what Bourdieu calls symbolic domination in the context of language use?
the fact that in a stratified society, even people who do not speak the prestige dialect tend to accept it as standard or superior
What term refers to languages that have descended from the same ancestral language?
daughter languages
One aspect of linguistic history is language loss. When a language disappears,
cultural diversity is reduced as well.
Recent genetic research suggests that a speech-friendly mutation took hold in humans around 150,000 years ago.
true
Kinesics is the study of communication through body movements, stances, gestures, and facial expressions.
true
Phonology is the study of speech sounds.
true
Syntax refers to the arrangement and order of words in phrases and sentences.
true
Focal vocabularies are found only in non-Western societies like the Eskimo and the Nuer.
false
All languages and dialects are equally effective as systems of communication.
true
African American Vernacular English (AAVE) is an incomplete linguistic system that is able only to express thoughts and ideas related to life in inner-city communities.
false
Historical linguists use linguistic similarities and differences in the world today to study long-term changes in language.
true
What is the term for the ability to create new expressions by combining other expressions?
productivity
The world’s linguistic diversity has been cut in half, as measured by the number of distinct languages extant, in the past 500 years; and half the remaining languages are predicted to disappear during this century.
true
The lexicon of a language is
a dictionary containing all of its morphemes and their meanings.
